Shock as Sarkozy woos anti-US leftwinger

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article1784811ece

Charles Bremner in Paris
Nicolas Sarkozy, the right-wing reformer who becomes French President on Wednesday, upset both the United States and his opponents yesterday by offering the job of Foreign Minister to a Socialist veteran with anti-American credentials.

Hubert Védrine, 59 — a former senior aide to the late President Mitterrand — who served as Foreign Minister from 1997 to 2002, was considering the proposal yesterday.

The prospect of Mr Védrine running foreign policy has infuriated the beleaguered Socialists and amazed the diplomatic world because he is the architect of a doctrine for containing what he called the abusive “steamroller” of American power. His views on “the hyperpower” — the term that he coined in the 1990s — would appear to conflict with Mr Sarkozy’s pro-Atlantic views.

Mr Sarkozy approached Mr Védrine and other figures from the Left as part of his scheme to forge a slimmed-down government that will be politically inclusive and not limited to his Gaullist Union for a Popular Movement.

Mr Sarkozy had promised surprises in his line-up and the idea of Mr Védrine at the Quai d’Orsay, the Foreign Ministry, was regarded as a clever ploy. As a distinguished veteran he would ensure continuity in France’s independent-minded stance while allowing the President, who traditionally runs foreign policy, to innovate.

François Hollande, the Socialist leader, told Mr Védrine, who enjoys a high reputation in the foreign policy world, that he and other possible recruits to the Sarkozy Government would be expelled from the party if they accepted. “You can’t belong to one side then join the other,” he said.

Mr Védrine holds no party rank, but as a former chief of staff of François Mitterrand and current director of the late President’s foundation, he is very much part of the left-wing family. He advised Ségolène Royal, the defeated presidential candidate, on foreign policy, writing her brief for her TV debate with Mr Sarkozy on May 3.

As well as Mr Védrine, other government candidates from the Left included Claude Allègre, the Socialist Education Minister under Lionel Jospin, the last Socialist Prime Minister, and Bernard Kouchner, the rights campaigner and former UN administrator in Kosovo, who served as a minister under Mitterrand. Anne Lauvergeon, a former close adviser to Mitterrand, who now heads AREVA, the national atomic energy firm, has also been approached.

Mr Sarkozy wants to halve the number of ministers to 15. At least seven will be women. A senior job is expected to go to Alain Juppé, the former Prime Minister who was given a suspended jail term two years ago for corruption.

Mr Juppé was convicted for his role in illicit Gaullist party financing while deputy mayor of Paris under Mr Chirac in the 1980s and early 1990s. While Presidential immunity shielded Mr Chirac, about two dozen former city and Gaullist officials were convicted after investigation of multimillion-pound scandals that emerged after his mayoral tenure.

From June 16, a month after he leaves office, Mr Chirac, 74, loses his immunity and could be liable to prosecution.

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